A few years ago I was overseas for work when, one day, I moved in a way my body obviously didn’t appreciate, and I did something to my back. It didn’t seem like a big deal, just a bit of a twinge, and I was due to start travelling home the next day, so I just ignored the pain, packed and went to bed.
We can only be deliberate about the way we live to the extent that we are deliberate about the way we lead ourselves – including the way we manage our emotions.
When I surveyed readers of this blog, one of the strongest themes that emerged was a desire for greater clarity in your lives. So what kind of deliberate experiments might help along that journey?
Well, recently I’ve been mulling on the phrase “Less but better”.
It’s the credo and book title of German designer Dieter Rams, famous for his minimalist approach to design and an influence on the design aesthetic of Apple.
You may have seen a video spoof that was created a number of years ago re-imagining Apple packaging in the Microsoft packaging style of the time. It demonstrates beautifully the merit of the ‘less but better’ principle in design.
Of course, it’s not just in design that Rams’ credo is worth consideration. The deliberate design of our lives should also prompt us to consider the ways in which ‘less but better’ might be worth implementation.
In my own life, I’ve been experimenting with designing a life of greater clarity by pursuing ‘less but better’…
A lot of things that don’t matter get said on twitter. A while back, though, I read something that changed my relationships for the better.
Tim Keller leads a church of over 5,000 people in New York City, a place with its fair share of egos, and perhaps not a culture that screams selflessness. In mid-2014, he tweeted the following, which was then retweeted more than 1000 times! Clearly, there was something that resonated in these words:
“Truth through words and ideas to change lives”
That’s my personal mission. My burn statement. It’s what I’m about.
It’s a guide by which I make decisions about what I do with my time; my energy; my life.
To me truth is core, because it changes things; it changes everything. I care deeply, profoundly about our ability to continue to agree that truth matters.
But even before you can believe that truth matters, you have to believe that truth exists.
That truth is.
